Hi Scott,
I have read your entry with great interest. I have an entry here as well - a travel-guide book and website of eco-friendly accommodation, organic food outlets and eco/cultural tourism in New Zealand. One of the questions I ask providers on my website is do they have disabled access? I would estimate 95% of them say no. I will tell them about you.
From my own personal experience, my cousin suddenly became paralyzed, she had 4 young children at the time and it has been, and continues to be, a big struggle for her family. They have difficulty with the simplest things, such as going out to a restaurant for dinner - the tables are too low to fit the chair under, the aisle is so narrow between tables there is no room for her to sit. There is very little thought or consideration towards her wellbeing or right to have access like anybody else. The family went to Australia for a week holiday last year and they were amazed at the difference in attitude. She was able to participate in every activity the family and kids enjoyed. I don't know why New Zealand should be so behind about these things? Have you been here?
Leonie

Dear Scott,

Your efforts here hit home in a very dramatic way for me this weekend. I was at a conference in montreal over the weekend and became friends with someone with a spinal cord injury. We needed to go from one building to another using a series of underground walkways and we were confronted with stairs and other obstacles that made wheelchair access difficult and inconvenient. As a person without mobility issues I am ashamed to have not really noticed or considered poor design before. My experience trying to figure out a viable route with my new friend was difficult and embarrassing.

On a more positive note, my experience has affirmed my commitment to provide universal access to our adventure programs (rafting, canoeing and kayaking). We will be posting information within the next 2 weeks regarding participation on our adventure programs on our new website www.whitewater.ca

I am pleased to inform you and those at Ashoka that your entry in the Geotourism Challenge has, in fact, invoked and inspired positive change in our operation.

You really are a Changemaker!

Thank you,

jim, erin & team esprit

Dear Scott,

We are writing from Mongolia to support your innovation that will bring a bright future to the people with disabilities.

Mongolia is homeland of great history of the world where the tourism industry has been relatively intensively developed for the past few years. However, experience, human resource and infrastructure on inclusive tourism are just in its embryo stage. Therefore, we are amazed by the project vast scope, which is including everyone(non-disabled and disabled community)and its benefits.

Since you are an experienced leader in this field, we believe that the project can be a model for disabled community who want to develop inclusive tourism in their countries.

All the best for your innovation.

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Claude "GeoT" Rallins
www.GeoTourism.tv

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The community commentary on this proposal to establish a network of Centers of Inclusive Tourism has been extraordinary! Changemakers have been central in fine-tuning the proposal. (Do I sense a humorous touch that it was chosen as Featured Entry on April Fool's Day?)
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I would like everyone who stumbles upon this Geotourism entry to know about another resource here at Changemakers -- an interview with Dr. Donald Hawkins.
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In my work we talk about "inclusion" - Inclusive Tourism, Inclusive Destination Development, Inclusive Geotourism. Dr. Hawkins, without mentioning disability, lists the allies and pro-poor bias that we intended by choosing the word "inclusion" when defining the field.
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Universal Design is the intellectual product of disability culture to answer the question posed by those with responsibility for social sustainability, "How do we include people with disabilities - the full range of human variation - into full social participation?" It made explicit a problem-solving and pragmatic approach. That generated the concrete demonstrations of full inclusion that gave lawmakers the courage to imagine and then legislate disability rights as human rights. Today, enshrined in Article 30 of the Convention on the UN's Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), we have the first international human rights document addressing disability and tourism.
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Taking it a step further, Dr. Hawkins is right when he says that tourism, "is really the largest ever transfer of wealth from rich to the poorer countries" and, as he cites Tim Fort's observation from the Institute for Corporate Responsibility that, "business could go a long way by using that commercial activity to stimulate peace."
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To meet the demands of justice as we build out the infrastructure of tourism it must be of accessible to all - at the physical and the services level - because we know that "anatomy is not destiny" and exclusion is not sustainable.
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Inclusive Geotourism shares the Disability Rights dictum, "Nothing about us without us" with the Responsible Tourism movement.
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No justice, no peace, no business.

Travelling is an activity that expands your mind and increases your social networking.
However for the 650 million people with disabilities (pwds) worldwide this simple pleasurable activity may be denied them because of barriers in accessibility. (WHO stats)

The questions we are all interested to know is : is there a place in geotourism for travellers with disabilities?
local initiatives by committed individuals, travel operators and some organisations have moved disability travel forward in their own way, showing us that it is possible to the natural beauty of cultural heritage sites yet enabling travellers with disabilities to enjoy such tourist spots.

The Rolling rains report has been a virtual resource of such information for most of us in the disability field on such local initiatives.

His project is timely as it will answer the question of how can we merge the two needs ensuring the evolvement of sustainable tourism that can also be enjoyed by travellers with disabilities on a global network.

His proposal of a resource centre with three strategically placed 'showrooms' of inclusive tourism will see these practical principles of accessible green tourism duplicated successfully at the local level given our own cultural, climatic and national tourism agenda.

In developing countries, people with disabilities often exist below the poverty line. And oftentimes because of the fact that they are not considered a consumer power, their needs for accessibility, for a barrier free environment that would in turn promote employment, education and recreational opportunities for them are seldom met.

As tourism is usually a major income earner for developing countries, promoting a global inclsuive tourism trend that would bring paying travellers with disabilities into the country would ensure that the basic accessible infrastructure would be implemented in that country, that would ultimately benefit the local disabled community.

As the publisher of CHALLENGES Magazine, Malaysia's 1st cross-disability lifestyle magazine, I welcome such projects that create greater awareness of the social and communal needs of people with disabilities worldwide.

In a county where accessible facilities are lacking and the excuse given is that there is no budget for it,I am absolutely sure promoting Inclusive Tourism in Malaysia, if successful, will bring about a great change. It is the general perception here that such facilities are extraordinary, needs money to be implemented and at the same time does not bring in profit of any kind.

Scott's approach here will be able to change those perceptions. First, tourism is one of the major industries here. Tourism dollars will definitely be an incentive to change the way things are being done. Moreover, this the government is current actively promoting the country as a second home for foreign retirees. Accessibility will add brownie points to that.

What we could not advocate successfully through old school methods, I believe beating round the bush method will work. The country earns revenue from such forms of tourism which in turn benefits the disabled community. This will also encourage domestic tourism as currently there are very few places that disabled people can visit.

Scott proposal is definitely pushing all the right buttons for us here in Malaysia. Given the opportunity, a Center of Excellence in Inclusive Tourism will bring about great benefit for the disabled people in Malaysia and at the same time, showcase the many great sights that have been hitherto out of bounds to many disabled people here.

Three events taking place today relate to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) although few participants in some of them are aware of the fact:
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The Second International Conference on Responsible Tourism in Kerala, India
The Blog Swarm on the CRPD is taking place throughout the blogosphere
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The CRPD is unique in that it is the first international human rights treaty to deal explicitly with tourism and persons with disability. This has extra significance because the document is also a legitimate expression of the political will of the worldwide disability community having arisen out of a laborious but transparent and participatory process. The kernel of the CRPD argument for full inclusion in tourism is Article 30 entitled, “Participation in Cultural Life, Recreation, Leisure and Sport.” Paragraph 5 reads in part
5. With a view to enabling persons with disabilities to participate on an equal basis with others in recreational, leisure and sporting activities, States Parties shall take appropriate measures:
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(c) To ensure that persons with disabilities have access to sporting, recreational and tourism venues;
(e) To ensure that persons with disabilities have access to services from those involved in the organization of recreational, tourism, leisure and sporting activities.
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This treaty establishes in international law the principle that Inclusive Tourism means physical accessibility and program accessibility.
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That is, Universal Design as ubiquitous and additional accessible design (and/or adaptive technologies) as necessary where physical access to a venue is insufficient as long as the programs and services offered to other tourists remain unavailable to tourists with disabilities.
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Public education on the role of CRPD in tourism is on the increase. One tool is the training manual “Human Rights Yes!” published by the University of Minnesota. As this conversation moves more into the mainstream look for contributions from institutions like the Responsible Tourism Conferences (Cape Town Declaration) and geographers such as those active on the GEOGABLE listserve.

I am pleased to see that Scott Rains has been nominated for the Changemaker competition.

Inclusive tourism is the wave of the future. As with most change, it has come from necessity, due to the older, affluent population, which has become far more mobile than previous generations. As a result, disabled too are spreading their wings to adventure and explore their planet, meet new cultures and contribute in a positive way to its development.

As North America's Disabled Adventurer, I have been able to explore and adventure, mostly alone, across all six habitable continents on this amazing planet.

In Argentina, I was able to wheel along a suspended, completely accessible track, into a maze of over 100 tropical waterfalls in Iguazu. It was thrilling and open to an adventurer in a wheelchair!

In Australia, a catamaran, also wonderful for my blue chair, whisked me away to the Great Barrier Reef, and a semi-submersible allowed me to venture beneath the waterline to explore the sea life and the amazing coral that makes up the reef itself.

On the other hand, I was prevented from exploring Kakadu National Park in northern Australia, when all the tour companies rejected me due to the fact that I was alone.

Additionally, many temples and shrines throughout Asia and even castles in Europe remain fortresses shutting out the disabled.

These are the words from Scott's own submission to this competition...

"Physical access to previously inaccessible cultural and natural riches is often the first step in true cultural literacy and green values. The interaction of local and foreign people with disabilities inevitably awakens reflection by each on their personal experiences of inclusion and exclusion, awareness and evaluation of their own culture, and exposure to undiscovered shared aspects of disability culture such as resiliency, interdependency, resistance, humor, and artistic expression. The presence of people with disabilities as unashamed social actors such as tourists with economic means is still a socially disruptive and artistically energizing event in many parts of the world."

I have seen the plight of the disabled in the Third World as well as here in the so called First World, and it is my belief that inclusive tourism, based on a thoughtful approach, will benefit both the cultures involved and the circumstances of indigenous disabled peoples. This type of endeavour will raise the public standing of the local disabled as the community recognises the rewards of having disabled tourists and tours reach into their villages and nations.

Before I met Scott Rains through the internet, I felt in many ways that I was only one of a few that tried to push the limits of inclusive travel. I know know this to be wrong, and have met many kindred spirits, all with the same hopes and goals - inclusive tourism in our lifetime.

I would like congratulate all the competitors here for their wonderful projects and efforts. No matter who ultimately wins, we are all the winners.

Many Changemakers in our society, are noteworthy in public media for their impact on change in a negative way, the same cannot be said for Scott Rains.

Access to all is so important, and the way Dr. Rains has organized this social media effort is a perspective changing boon to both the visitors and local people involved. We hope Green Maps created around the world can help disabled people enjoy their geotourism experiences more deeply - our icons include symbols for wheelchair accessible, senior-friendly and others that help 'level the playing field'.

Dr. Scott Rains,

Inclusive Tourism is a "crusade" dear to my heart! I also detest, to my very core, inaccessibility! The problem I have been confronted with throughout my disabled life is trying to convince architectural, commercial, public and governmental establishments that accessibility means increased financial gains as well as accessibility for the disabled! It just makes good "cents!" The American disabled community spent almost $14 billion last year on tourism! If that figure doesn't attract the attention of tourism planners, nothing will! Try to imagine what the world disabled community spent!

I believe that one of our "Centers of Excellence" should be located on the Yucatán Peninsula. The vacation center for all of North and Central America!

When we focus on establishing a "Center of Excellence" we need to consider the positive impact that such a center might have on the local population, their psychological makeup, their financial structuring, their architectural designs, community planning, and the disabled community. It needs to be located where it will do the most good and where its' influence will have the greatest exposure!

Again Scott, I thank you for your leadership!

Take Care and Stay Well,
Bill

My name is Rosangela Berman Bieler, I'm President of the Inter-American Institute on Disability & Inclusive Development (IIDI). I have been working closely with Scott Rains for the last 2-3 years on the creation of a "South Cone Tourism for All Network", involving Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina and Chile. The project’s vision is to comprehensively apply the principles of sustainability and social inclusion to tourist destinations, aiming to promote infrastructural, socioeconomic, and cultural changes that improve quality of life and well being for both visitors and local residents. The main objective is to create a network of tourist destinations based on integrated, comprehensive plans for environmental management, accessibility, and inclusive services for tourists with different levels of functional limitation, including elderly persons and persons with disabilities.

The project’s central strategy is to tap a large but unexplored tourist market and make communities more socially and ecologically responsible, more economically balanced, and more inclusive for all – within a sustainable development model. The proposal is to identify areas with a strong tourist appeal in key ports to be selected on the coast of the Southern Cone of Latin America, among those receiving domestic and international cruise ships. The scope of activity includes public policies, services, and works and activities by private enterprise and the Third Sector and International Cooperation.

During these past years working in collaboration with Scott Rains, he has been a fundamental conceptual and networking resource for us, bringing to the project the attention and the support of people related to the Tourism Industry, Academia and Universal Design Experts. Scott is a born networker and he is a constant inspiration for us moving ahead, even under so many adversities that we have to face when working in countries with low structure for inclusion. Scott has been offering us technical assistance and has been disseminating our initiatives throughout the world.

I hope he can get the visibility and the support he deserves for this proposal.

Why Scott? Because he knows a lot, and apart from that he consistently writes about his experiences globally. He travels, work and gives conferences globally. He knows different cultures and because of that he knows the strengths, and the things that have to be worked on. He is very perceptive, entrepreneuring, active and a happy person. He conects with everybody regardless of level of study. He knows what was done in the US in the last few years and so he is bright enough for planning what can be done in other countries without comiting the same errors. Not always life gives you a second oportunity.
We have a saying in Argentina. 'Experience is a comb that life gives you when you are bold'.

THIS IS AN OPORTUNITY TO GIVE SCOTT AND TO A LOT OF PEOPLE A COMB, A BRUSH, SRAY AND MODELING MOUSSE to get global awareness on what ACCESSIBLE TOURISM can do for the disabled and not disabled people.
Tourism can get countries together, can get awareness on susteinability of places to be visited, it can get awareness on the needs of disabled people, families and relatives when travelling.
So to whoever it may concern, Scott is the best stylist, give him the instruments!!!

Sincerelly,
Nelida Barbeito
nbarbeito@ttsviajes.com
54 11 5941 9694
Major in tourism specialized in accessible tourism in Argentina

Hi Scott,
It occurred to me that the statistics we use showing the importance of the access tourism market are somewhat out of date. For example, the 2002 figure of $13.6 million spent by people with disabilities on travel in the USA alone must be way below what PWDs actually spend now six years later.

And of course, any statistics we have on worldwide spend have to be way below reality because of the growing disposable wealth in countries like China, with its sizable population. Here in New Zealand for example, China is becoming a more important market as people from that country begin to spend their disposable income on travel - a trend that can only continue.

Also, we should factor in aging baby boomers (a huge group), who are beginning to experience disability and are thus swelling the population of PWDs (already the worlds largest minority). But what can you do? Clearly, updated research is needed on this topic, if only to pursued the tourism industry of the commercial importance of access tourism.
Cheers
Sandra Rhodda
Tai Poutini Polytechnic
Greymouth, New Zealand

I know Scott Rains as the most active person in promoting universal design. When I first met Dr. Scott Rains I was already going pregnant with similar visions of change, that will have to happen in the hospitality business in order to accommodate travelers with disability.

1999 I founded RollOn Travel as specialized tour operator for disabled travelers. Since then I am accompanying tours, designing accessible tour programs and promote our vision of a barrier free travel environment.

As a service provider for disabled people we face many difficulty's but the most disturbing problem are the Hotel room designs. We found that almost all Hotel Rooms are build with barriers for disabled travelers. Especially the bathroom designs cause unnecessary difficulty's for disabled travelers.

With Scott Rains help I am now working on a recommendation paper to inform Hotels and architects about the basic architectural needs of disabled travelers. This is of course just a first step towards the goal of a universal accessible environment.

Xable.com is a media production company run by Elio Navarro. Elio's work focuses on the community of which he is a part - the community of people with disabilities.
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The site has hours of interesting clips and interviews. Here is an conversation between Elio & I at the 2008 SATH Congress in Orlando Florida on Inclusive Tourism.
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The interview is a broad-ranging discussion on the topic of travel and disability in the privileged context of two people with disabilities able to assume certain commonalities and focus on typically overlooked issues.
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For those into filmography trivia and costume design the stylish T-shirt I am wearing was a gift of the chief of the Bunun Tribe of Taitung, Taiwan. He also is a person with a disability and very eager to have his people benefit from Inclusive Tourism. If ever you have the opportunity visit thm for the extraordinary eight-part harmony that is their heritage.
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http://www.xable.com/videos/100370

I met Scott at the SATH World Congress (Society for Accessible Travel and Hospitality) in Florida, January 2008. He spoke at the conference on Inclusive Design in Tourism. His expertise and intellectual knowledge on this topic far exceeds anyone I've ever met. I'm from Ontario, Canada where for over 30 years I have supported people with spinal cord injury, Acquired Brain injury and other disabilities to integrate into their non accessible communities. If developing an activity agenda, it made sense to provide inclusion in order for the entire group to participate. However, our communities are not designed in a functional capacity. When design changes happen, the obvious needs, such as for mobility access are identified, but for those who have cognitive or visual impairments, accessing their community becomes a barrier, and quite often they give up and remain isolated. Our company, Community Solutions Ltd. provides rehab support following an accident, with support in travel and community access. I fully support Scott in his plan for Universal Design for Inclusion for all! Let's make this a world in which no matter what our challenges may be, we can all participate together. Scott, your links to get people from around the world to network on this mission, has opened up an opportunity for global connections. Thank you for all you do!

Scott, this is a wonderful project.

Being blind myself, I would certainly welcome Braille in all elevators and at least one page with the most important numbers next to the phone in every room of all hotels.

However, if there is something that would help even more than this, is a minimum of standardization. In other words: room numbers that one can feel, that are placed always in the same location relative to the door; magnetic keys that are not perfectly rectangular, so one always knows how it should be inserted without having to ask for help or try all 4 possible positions; elevator Braille labels in the same position relative to the buttons; and maybe museums that provide MP3 players for blind visitors so they can get descriptions of what is on display.

Btw, on the second example, it would be easy for magnetic key system manufacturers to simply have the right corner of the end which remains towards the user or outside the lock when being used, cut, so that it does not have a 90-degree corner just like the other three.

Your project can help disseminate ideas like this one, that cost nothing and yet make a significant difference in the quality of the traveler's experience.

Best of luck, you have my vote!

Fernando

I've tried traveling to Asian countries on my own or with my wheelchair-user friends, and each time, even if we purchased our tickets directly fr airline branch office, we still need to call the headquarters to inform them of our 'special needs,' contact all the travel insurance agents and see who will accept or reject us this time, even though they accepted our previous applications before, and then locating wheelchair-accessible hotels, locate accessible destinations we can go to, and how we are to get there. Whether local public transport is accessible, or how we can booked lifted-van services, if there's one.

Before we even started on our journey, we are already worn out. If only we have a centre to give us all the informations we need, we can save a lot of energy for our travel and not preparing for our travel. And in case of emergency, we also need a local agent who can give us immediate assistance.

That's my two cents worth for you Scott, looking forward to a much needed Accessible Tourism centre in Asia soon.

Regards,
Lee-chin

Hi Scott,

Remembering I was nearly barred from flying unaccompanied in 2005, traveling to Japan from Malaysia, traveling unaccompanied is no longer such a big deal with major airlines now.

With all the budget airlines booming up in Asia, traveling for wheelchair-users is still only for the rich. Because most budget airport terminals in Asia are not accessible, even if we have 4 personal assistants to carry us onboard, the airline will still reject you for no reasons at all.

Most countries in Asia lacks barrier-free facilities, so unless we really have 4 personal assistants to carry us up and down buses, group tours is out of the question. The only place we can travel unaccompanied is big and expensive cities in US, Europe, Australia, Japan.

Most hotels in Asia do not provide wheelchair-accessible hotel rooms, only a few 4 or 5 star hotels would provide one wheelchair accessible room in superior or suite.

We can only depend on taxi to our destination spot, and if you travel with 2 or 3 wheelchair-users, each of us have to ride and pay for our own taxi. But always, it's impossible to hail even one taxi back to your hotel afterwards, and if you don't speak the local language, you can't even dial for one.

Traveling aside, most travel insurance reject our application outright, even with medical certificate signed by a doctor that we are fit to travel. We either have to travel without travel insurance or trust it to the agent who took our application that if accident do happen, they won't try to get away claiming we are already impaired before the accident.

in Jordan; which I was not aware off.

We counted on Scott to guide us in the past and we are looking forward for his Center of Excellence in Inclusive Tourism to guide us in the future. The Centre which Dr Scott Rains is proposing to Geotourism Challenge deserves the support of all the stakeholders involved in the tourism industry globally and Geotourism Challenging Fund in particular, the support should be for such individual's innovators with the global vision for all and this is what "Scott's proposed Centre" is about .
We are in this region lending all our support to Scott's proposal as its timely right for our project and would definitely empower the work not just in our region but in other regions like us too and will give breadth to accessible tourism training worldwide and will act as an excellent technical term of reference to all of us. I believe that it will be a success story for Geotourism Challenge to tell about in the near future. We welcome to see his project through.
My personal message to Scott, please continue to do what is possible and thank you for your years of work into this proposal and for considering these comments.
Ibrahim Abu-Helil

• Scott's proposal has a strong influential awareness message; a number of our business community, already took practical investment steps in the region in countries such as Jordan and Dubai, for the first time, where a series of projects to cater for the disabled tourists locally and globally are in process.
• Scott's implementation approach is an innovative one at least at our regional level, because it calls for the involvement of a wide range of suppliers, providers, professionals and users within the region tourism industry and the all in the all inclusive design including the disabled people, architects, tourist officials and others.
• Scott's proposal is sending a strong lasting social change message, where for the first time the estimated number of the 31 million people with disabilities in the region, would be able to think that they could use the tourism facilities and they are a targeted tourists' segments and a new market trends including seniors.
• I feel that Scott's proposal is an excellent example in embodying Geotourism principles in terms of quality and sustainability, because he is advocating the application of the best of Universal Design practices, which means his proposal, is striving towards quality of services and management of customers on sustainable bases including people with special needs challenges.
• Tourists with special needs challenges, have being marginalized for decades, in terms of academic and market research, of whom they are? Where they are? What their wants are? Scotts' centre or centers as his proposal is intending to is timely right to be supported to bridge of this gap of lack of data and knowledge about this marginalized part of the tourism industry and I am sure his proposed centre/centers will be our think-tank forum of discussion and Excellency.
• Scotts is seems to me is wholeheartedly devoted and well knowledgeable and an information disseminator, on what he is doing, of particular, about accessible tourism, when I mentioned to him about my local community project, he shared with me of information about our local tourism project in

NAT-MENA-P is an entrepreneurial Euro-Middle Eastern & North Africa Regional Project wanting to serve people with special needs at local, regional and global levels, by promoting and institutionalising the Inclusive/Accessible Tourism approach, based on introducing the applications of best standards and practices of Universal Design into the region touristic facilities. Our mission to work with the tourism region industry stakeholders, to be receptive to tourism accessibility for disabled and seniors guests travellers in both regions, and worldwide tourists who wanting to visit the MENA region. With a driven goal, this is given tourists with special challenges needs, equal opportunities and more choices outside Europe as other tourists alike.
As a Project Leader, on behalf of ENAT-MENA Project, I am writing to strongly support Dr. Scott proposal to start Centres of Excellence in Inclusive Tourism and I seen no reason why it should not be approved, for a host of reasons.
• The support background, in the processes to achieving our regional project, I've been introduced to Scott electronically through ENAT. Scott's prompt communications and 'Services for FREE’, without knowing each other, tremendously impressed us. Scott's support was excellent and indeed invaluable source to be consulted in developing and building up our proposal.
• As a result of this, we feel that Scott's proposal will defiantly would have a global impact, because we tried and experienced his work and it has been instrumental in raising the level of awareness within our region, of particular, the stakeholders within the business sector, to realize for the first time, the business viability for the inclusion of people with disabilities, as potentially valuable economic actors and guests for the region tourism industry.

Ibrahim Abu-Helil

Best wished Scott with your entry. You do a fantastic job in an area that needs it - your energy and depth of knowledge puts me to shame! Keep up the good work.

At my blog RollingRains.com I have been posting about Responsible Tourism and how it links to issues of disability.

Compare this list of characteristics of Responsible Tourism from the Cape Town Declaration of 2002 with the description of the Centers of Excellence project. The project aligns with the Responsible Tourism values presented in the Declaration.

The language referring to people with disabilities in the Declaration was very likely chosen thoughtfully.

Yet by specifying physical disabilities the document suggests that Responsible Tourism is not concerned with sensory, intellectual, or emotional disabilities. On the surface it appears that physical access is the only goal. Program access -- more directly social inclusion piece -- is an equally important goal. Program access is the ability for all to participate in services provided to tourists beyond simple physical accessibility.

This project understands full inclusion and participation by people all - including people with disabilities to be the truest reading of the phrase.

Let's be careful that the language of the conference document to come from the Second International Conference on Responsible Tourism in Kerala, India next month encompasses the full range of difference in abilities and communicates its goal as inclusion both physically and programatically.

I haven't had the good fortune of meeting Scott yet but whatever interaction I have had with him on the mail has been enlightening. He is doing great work and it would be a big step forward if his project gets through.
I am working in the field of barrier free environment with an organization called Svayam. We are striving to make our city i.e New Delhi accessible. We are working with civic agencies of the city for providing accessible public toilets in the city and have been successful in the same. The accessible toilet design given by us has been accepted by them and is being implemented.
People with disabilities account for approximately 70 million of India's population and the aging population adding to it makes it an even bigger number which just cannot be ignored. Accessibility is an important aspect of providing a dignified and independent life to people with disabilities along with the greying population who due to age related problems have reduced mobility. Access, right from home to public transportation, educational institutions, work places and other public areas is required. A centre like the one proposed by Scott if established in India would really help the cause and take it forward. India having a large geographical area coupled with a large population, our work is like a drop in the ocean. Universal design and barrier free environment is the need of the hour.
The comments on the site are quite enlightening and show that a lot of work is being done in this sector the world over. Let's make the world barrier free and accessible to all.

Cheers!!

Kavita Agrawal
India

Hi Scott,
By reading through all the comments I learned of the wheel chair accessible car rentals, the lightweight sling for transferring people out of their wheelchairs so they can participate in outdoor sport and the hand-powered elevator. These are all great examples of the universal designs you are working on. It would be great if you could include a few of these (and other) examples in the entry form. Thanks!

Dana Frasz
Changemakers